Father
by compte.ferme
Summary: Father, you don’t look happy to see me. Surely after five – or more? – years you have forgiven me? But no, it appears not. Surely you have at least accepted the fact that I ran away to sea. JE Post AWE about 5 years.


**Father**

**Jasmine Signet**

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Father, you don't look happy to see me. Surely after five – or more? – years you have forgiven me? But no, it appears not. If there is one thing that I have learned in these years, it is that humans rarely forgive grievances. Surely you have at least accepted the fact that I ran away to sea. Could you call the guards to arrest your daughter, I wonder? I think that if one were to be broken enough, one would hurt even their own flesh and blood. Humans are such temperamental creatures. Your hand is shaking. I wonder if I have hurt you that much, Father. Do you hurt? Perhaps that was an unnecessary question.

If there is one thing I am sorry for, it is that I left you to brave the rumours that must have flown around. Imagine, the Governor's well-bred, well-mannered, well-spoken daughter – the daughter who at one stage was betrothed to the man who was once a Commodore; the daughter who abandoned the Commodore for a lowly, poor blacksmith – running away to sea, on the arm of a pirate, no less! Though, if you have noticed, my speech is something that piracy was unable to change. Perhaps those tutors you hired were actually of some use. Even now, I can conjugate all those French verbs which I learnt all those years ago. Certainly the dressmakers were not of any use whatsoever. The corsets and dresses and shoes I was able to throw away quite easily. I am not sorry for seeking freedom. The constraints of society are so narrow.

You say that I was happier with Will Turner. Happy, perhaps, but with Will I had never and would never taste the tang of the sea nor the wind in my face, and with all this the ecstasy of freedom. And I think, Father, that what you mean is that _you _would have been happier if I had married Will Turner. Do not look so affronted, Father, it is true. Better a good, stalwart man like Will Turner, even if he was naught but a poor blacksmith and the son of a pirate, than the pirate Jack Sparrow. But, Father, the thing you do not understand, will never understand, is that Jack is a good man. One with questionable morals, perhaps, but a good man nonetheless. Will understood this as you never will. But Will never squared with his pirate blood. Ironic, isn't it, that the man who taught me to handle a cutlass was Will? He was always a better swordsman than Jack, put more work and time into his swordsmanship, had more natural talent and applied himself to the task harder, but Jack always won. Jack always wins.

It was Jack who taught me to use a flintlock pistol; to draw and aim and shoot. I still only use the pistol he gave me, though it was neither new nor flashy. It meant a lot to him, the pistol that he carried for ten years with the one shot that he would only use to kill Barbossa. Carry it well, Lizzy, he said. I remember him by it. But to return to the topic. The cutlass and the pistol; the two weapons a pirate uses. You look horrified – weapons are not for women to play with, aye? But Father, I did not _play_ with them, I fought with them. And they saved my life on many an occasion.

Ah, Father, you know well that since I was a young girl that the one thing I was fascinated with was not my dolls, not my books, not my fancy dresses nor my high-heeled shoes, but the legend and the mystery around piracy and the infamous Captain Jack Sparrow. Perhaps you should have disregarded my plea to save the man who pulled me from the bottom of the sea and later turned me to it. Perhaps you should have let the then Commodore Norrington do his worst and kill the man who saved your daughter from the little conscience he has. The man who saved my life. The man you ordered your men to shoot, remember? The man who tore off my corset. And indeed, he did pull off the corset which was the constraints of being a well-bred lady. He was the man who led me to freedom. The man who I later discovered was the Jack Sparrow whose tales and exploits I was captivated with. The man who sacked Nassau Port without a single shot. The man who taught me the ways of love and the ways of longing – not the young, first love I had with Will, but a love that I would have died for. A violent, passionate love and was as poisoned with lust as you now think I am poisoned. He seduced me, you say? Seduced me to his evil ways and so I lost my way? No, Father. I was seduced by the sea. I was seduced by freedom, and its wonder and its taste. I was seduced by piracy and the rebellion and the lack of conformity that surrounded it. I even remember, once, when I was young and foolish and full of youthful ideals and ideas and convinced that I was in love with William Turner that you said that piracy could be the right course. But what you failed to mention, Father, was that it could lead you to the right course.

I am twisting your words? No, Father, it is true. But I imagine the truth is not what you would like. It is rather amusing, for one of the many things that Jack taught me is that the truth is often worse than lies. You look scandalized. I suppose that truth can be useful – but then again, truth is one of those ideals that you, like so many well brought-up individuals still hold dear. I remember upholding beliefs of virtue and chastity, honesty and justice.

Why have I returned? Why, I am your daughter, Father, however much you would like to deny it. In my veins run your blood – and what was that phrase you so liked to quote? Oh, yes – _blood is thicker than water_.

I am no daughter of yours? But, Father, I am. I am so much your daughter that it terrified me and terrifies me still. When I first ran away, I could go nowhere, see nothing, hear nothing, _do_ nothing without seeing your face or hearing your words or think of what you were doing. It was not homesickness, no – only longing for family, which Jack could not give me. But as I changed from a young woman to a woman, a stowaway to a sailor, a sailor to a pirate – my family turned into my friends and crew. And yet, any relatively young person needs a father. I can see you looking away. This conversation is making you uncomfortable. So, yes, I did miss you. I can see the tears gathering in your eyes. What has become of your daughter, you think. Only the freedom every soul deserves. Perhaps too much freedom? I suppose that it is possible.

I have not gone insane, Father. No, don't protest, I can see it in your eyes. You think that too much time in the company of someone as fey as Captain Jack Sparrow has made me mad. If indeed I have gone mad, it is not the influence of Jack Sparrow, but rather the power and strength of freedom and the happiness it can bring. Is it not a sad thing when the happiest moment in my life was when I was lying on the deck of the _Black Pearl_ under the roof of the night sky bedecked with the moon and the silver stars, brighter and ten times more beautiful than any diamond I could have bought, when I, the daughter of the Governor of Port Royal, has lived in complete luxury her entire life? That lying there with the man I loved who for that night convinced me that he loved me – though if you think that someone as free as Jack could tell any woman he loved them you are severely disillusioned – could be the happiest thing that I, in my relatively short life, have ever experienced? He had not the gallantry of Will Turner, but he had this commanding presence that made women love him and men want to follow him – even Will fell under Captain Jack Sparrow's spell. After all, he followed him to World's End, fought at his back, defended his name to those higher in rank and of far more influence than he.

I was free here? Oh, but Father, this is what I mean. Through no fault of your own, you have inherited such a narrow mind. It is nothing but the environment in which you were brought up and spent your life in. I could not find freedom in Port Royal.

But back to the longing for family I suffered from. I learned that heartache can be mended if you have someone else to love. And for this, you may thank Jack, though of course you cannot now. After all, what other reason would I have to come back? My name is spoken with almost as much awe as Captain Jack Sparrow's himself. It was always a great, constant source of irritation to Jack that it had taken me five years to build up a reputation almost as good as one it had taken him fifteen to attain. And yet, many a time we've – yes, we've, I sailed and still do under Jack's colours – bested Admiral Norrington in a battle. The man still cannot bear to sink a ship I sail on, did you know that? He checks if I am on the ship before he runs out the long nines. He was always disappointed to see that I stood at Jack's side. Sweet sentiment. Yet I was always surprised that he decieved us in such a way, making off with Davy Jones' heart like that. An audacious move, to be sure. Even Jack admitted to me that he had been tricked – the Jack Sparrow who entranced my heart with his insane brilliance and crazy confidence.

You are wincing. You do not like the idea that I was Jack's lover.

But, Father, I am not here to beg penance, nor to remind you of times gone by which I am sure you would rather forget. I am here to say a final goodbye. Have you ever loved? Loved someone so much that you were fatally aware of your faults and were never sure of their love? No? You say you loved my mother, a woman I never knew, though a good woman I am sure. But clearly your love was not of that sort, for you are still here while she isn't.

I have gone too far. I can see you yearning to call the guards to arrest me. I'm afraid I can't let you do that. I did tell you that I could handle a pistol.

Captain Jack Sparrow, the immortal, infallible Captain Jack Sparrow lived – and died, in the end, by the hand of Lady Luck. And though Lady Luck favoured him more often than not, not even Jack could survive when she turned her face. He was mayhap the only man in the world ever to die twice, and to live but once. And though I had amassed quite a reputation, and was by all accounts a good sailor, I did not and never could command the respect and loyalty that Jack could. And so, the crew scattered to the four winds. Jack left me his beautiful _Black Pearl_, did you know? It was his pride, the thing that drove him to World's End and back, the lady who he risked eternal servitude, the beauty which sharpened his desire for revenge, the fire which let him keep going for ten long hard years. He left me his _Black Pearl _and his compass. Did I tell you? When Will and I brought him back, Will left. Somehow, he knew that my heart was no longer his, but trapped in a steel cage crying for freedom and the heart of Captain Jack Sparrow. Of course, I do not know whether I earned that love, can only speculate and hope. But at least I will go knowing that we had something beautiful, something that was enduring and wonderful and which was worth every inch of sorrow I had for my ultimate betrayal and the love of Will Turner which I left behind with my childhood. Captain Jack Sparrow knew me better than I ever did. I thought that I was strong enough to resist my curiosity, but I wasn't. I realise now that I never was. He knew what I wanted better than I ever did. How well I remember that fateful day on the _Black Pearl_ when he told me that I wouldn't be able to resist! How well I remember him telling me that all I really wanted was to act on selfish impulse and to do what I wanted to do when I wanted it! And it is true. All I have ever wanted was to do what I wanted, and this led me to freedom.

And now, I set sail for World's End, to bring Captain Jack Sparrow his beautiful _Black Pearl_. The compass will lead me there, through storms and wind and rain. And, Father, this will be the last you will ever see of me, and the last that the people will hear of the infamous Elizabeth Swann who threw away everything she had for the brief taste of freedom, and the love of Captain Jack Sparrow.

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**A/N: So... How's my first PoTC fanfic? Please drop by and leave a review!**


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